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Deadbeat cities need to pay up for county inspector general

A worker at Palm Beach International Airport removes portrait of Mary McCarty in 2009 after she announced her resignation and said she would plead guilty to a federal corruption charge. She was one of four commissioners in four years to resign amid criminal charges. (Photo: Damon Higgins/The Palm Beach Post)

There are many good reasons why Palm Beach County needs a strong and vigorous Office of Inspector General.

A few of them are named Tony Masilotti, Warren Newell, Mary McCarty and Jeff Koons — the commissioners who faced a parade of charges from 2007-10, resigned their posts in shame and were sentenced to prison or, in Koons’ case, probation.

We mention them as a reminder to the leaders of many of Palm Beach County’s cities and towns, who apparently have forgotten that, just a few years ago, this county had to endure the mocking nickname, “Corruption County.”

To combat that sorry image, and to protect against future abuses of the public trust, county commissioners in 2009 — those not behind bars, that is — voted unanimously to create an ethics commission, adopt a code of ethics and, above all, establish an independent Office of Inspector General.

Such was the fervor to drive out corruption and usher in a new culture of ethical government that voters in all 38 of Palm Beach County’s cities and towns overwhelmingly approved a charter amendment in 2010 that extended the reach of the county’s inspector general and ethics commission to the municipalities.

A whopping 72 percent of voters countywide said “yes” to the reforms. There were majorities in every single municipality.

So where are those cities and towns now that the bills are due? They’re ducking out on their responsibilities, that’s where. Fourteen of them are paying not a dime to support the IG’s office that is the cornerstone of the shiny new ethical culture that so many elected officials professed to want so badly.

As The Post reported last week, the 14 cities went to court in 2011, arguing that the county was trying to grab cities’ money to pay for a county program. Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Catherine Brunson rejected the claims this year, as well as a request to rehear the case. The cities went to the 4th District Court of Appeal, which hasn’t ruled.

While the lawyers file more papers, the county’s biggest cities have become deadbeats. West Palm Beach (which owes $809,860 for its share of IG operations since 2011), Boca Raton ($576,394), Delray Beach ($498,668) and Riviera Beach ($244,937) have paid exactly nothing.

All in all, the 38 cities and towns have coughed up only about a tenth of the money they owe.

Being stiffed by the municipalities means that the IG’s office is operating with roughly half the $2.8 million annual budget that the ordinance envisioned. Instead of the 40 people it ought to have to oversee local governments, with their combined 13,000 employees and $7.5 billion in budgets, the IG is operating with 22 people (though currently funded for 23). Almost all the money it does have is from the county government, which is paying its share and a bit extra, Inspector General John Carey told The Post Editorial Board.

John A. Carey

Even at half-strength, the office is saving millions of taxpayer dollars. Since June 2010, inspectors have identified $24 million in local government spending that was avoidable or might indicate fraud, waste or abuse, according to the IG website. Delray Beach, for example stands to save $9 million over six years by heeding the IG’s advice to rebid a previously awarded no-bid solid-waste contract, Carey said.

Carey, who took the job last year after being a deputy inspector general overseeing 15 federal spy agencies, said that in the federal government, every dollar spent on IG oversight brings a savings of $17. The same efficiency can happen here, he said. But it will take several years to gear up — and a full budget.

The price tag to fully fund the IG’s office is hardly outrageous. It translates to $1.80 per county resident per year.

That’s a pittance compared with the millions potentially saved by detecting fraud, waste and abuse. The cities should drop this petulant lawsuit, put their resistance aside and carry out the will of the voters. From one end of this large county to the other, residents made it plain they want cleaner government. It’s time to pay the cleaning crew.